24 March 2011

Art Shows in Chennai

Perhaps in a move to dynamise the art scene in Chennai, there are a huge number of exhibitions going on in chennai - Paintings sculpture, installations etc...

Today I visited two expos - one at Ashvita and the other at Lalit Kala Academy. It was strangely moving to see the art objects. The Ashvita one was a bit disappointing because the catalogue showed some works which were not in the gallery -- they had been exhibited at Hotel Taj Coromandel I believe... yet many younger artists were exhibited and it was fun to see them trying to depict the unusual - A room with ears stuck all over the walls... conjured up an image of facebook, where so many silently take in what you post!

There was an artist who freaked out on a pink pig. I can understand wanting to depict what is looked down upon but the pig was so much of a cartoon pig, that it did not really evoke anything.

Benitha's work with cottonwool and brown ink was reminiscent of her own earlier work but touching nonetheless.

Next was a visit to LKA. This was a much larger one with many more works including sculpture, paintings etc. I did not make a detailed note of the names and titles of works, but all the sculptures and most of the paintings were very powerful images.
Man- woman; desire; persona; sexuality were the themes of most and very strong images, natesh's drawing from the female eunuch was a strong statement, for example.

Some artists had used words, which I could not understand why, but the other aspects were stunning and I could, even uninitiated, touch a small part of what the artists were trying to convey.

There were a few movies and the one "laughing at the sine curve" was really touching.
Outside LKA was an installation of 3-D pictures depicting the Union Carbide tragedy; with sound effects too, which was a great attempt.

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